


Hymn To Aphrodite

by linguamortua



Series: 90 Minute Timed Writing Challenge - May 2015 [1]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Author Has A Poorly Disguised Crush On Allison Janney, Boss/Employee Relationship, Cunnilingus, F/F, Female-Centric, Feminist Themes, Femslash, Oral Sex, Tony Stark Is Redundant
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-15
Updated: 2015-05-15
Packaged: 2018-03-30 16:20:47
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,554
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3943456
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/linguamortua/pseuds/linguamortua
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Come to me once more, and abate my torment;<br/>Take the bitter care from my mind, and give me<br/>All I long for; Lady, in all my battles<br/>Fight as my comrade.<br/>- Sappho, <a href="http://www.stoa.org/diotima/anthology/vandiver.shtml">Hymn to Aphrodite</a></p>
            </blockquote>





	Hymn To Aphrodite

**Author's Note:**

> Written in 90 minutes from a prompt submitted to me as part of a self-imposed timed writing challenge. This piece is for my long-suffering significant other, who has had to hear more about men fucking than he ever wanted to, and requested some Pepper/Natasha action.
> 
> You can add me [on Tumblr](http://lingua-mortua.tumblr.com/).

‘God,’ says Pepper, flushing slightly with embarrassment and a rather large glass of Chablis, ‘sleeping with the boss. What a terrible cliché.’ She rests her forehead on her hand for a moment. The table is semi-private, tucked behind a dividing wall, and they’re several floors up and gazing out across the city. She allows herself the moment of weakness.

‘Did you two ever?’ Natalie asks. ‘I signed an NDA, so it’s safe with me.’ She widens her eyes comically, as if they’re discussing a company secret.

‘Oh! No, no, we danced around each other for years but it never happened.’ Pepper divides up the beautiful, light sea bass on her plate with her fork and savours the warmth of the ginger, the soy sauce. She takes a bite and it flakes apart on her tongue, almost melting.

‘You’re conflicted.’ It’s emphatically not a question.

‘It wouldn’t have mattered whether we had or not,’ Pepper shrugs. ‘You saw the Forbes article. You heard the Fox News coverage.’ Natalie nods, of course: a beautiful, poised executive assistant with a solid gold resume needs no insight into the hearts of powerful men. It doesn’t need saying, but Pepper wants it out there: _I didn’t, I didn’t, he gave all this to me but I didn’t pay him for it, not like that_.

‘I tried to explain it Tony, once – we were at this party – and I just couldn’t, you know? Because he’s so—’

‘So _Tony_ ,’ Natalie drawls.

‘Right?’ Pepper asks, leaning forward. ‘Right? I mean, he just doesn’t listen. No, that’s unfair, he _might_ listen. He listens to JARVIS. Oh God, listen to _me_ , I sound so bitter. I’m sorry.’

‘It’s okay,’ Natalie replies, sipping from her wineglass with a rosebud mouth. Pepper watches, comes unmoored for a second as Natalie delicately licks her top lip.

‘I didn’t even want him,’ she muses. ‘Not really. But he would flirt, and it was fun, and I just wanted him to _recognise_ — _’_

‘—how important you are,’ smiles Natalie, winsome and attentive.

‘Oh, Natalie, don’t!’ Pepper cries, aghast. ‘Please don’t treat me like a boss – like a Tony,’ she finishes, despairing.

‘How would you like me to treat you?’ Natalie asks.

‘Just,’ Pepper says, waving her wine glass inarticulately, ‘just like—’

‘Like a woman?’ Natalie’s voice is low and rich, and when she tilts her head her curls fall softly against her breasts.

‘Like a woman,’ Pepper says back, very softly, and that’s where it begins, Natalie falling into Pepper’s bed as easily as slipping into a warm bath.

 

*

 

At first it’s once, and then twice in quick succession, and then Natalie becomes as much a fixture of Pepper’s home life as her work life. The wonderful thing about being a woman in charge, Pepper thinks, is that nobody suspects anything when you always leave work with your assistant. They share the back of the spacious car, laughing quietly with their heads together, touching each other’s hands and wrists to look at a new watch, turn a phone screen a little more, or admire a manicure. Happy smiles at them indulgently as he holds the door open.

‘You two sure are pals,’ he tells them, pleased when everyone he likes is getting along. They smile at him brightly, in almost perfect unison.

‘Sure are!’ Natalie says, and she slips her arm through Pepper’s, just two best friends unwinding after work. ‘ _Gal pals_ ,’ she murmurs to Pepper as she waves Happy off.

Inside, they kick off their Louboutins and Natalie suddenly whirls and runs on light, athletic feet up the stairs with a flirtatious smile backwards which begs Pepper to chase her. When Pepper gets to the bedroom door, Natalie flies at her from the dressing room, tackles her to the bed and wraps her strong thighs around Pepper’s hips. She is supple and lithe like a cat. She smells like poppy perfume and makes Pepper’s head spin like opium when they kiss.

 

*

 

Since Natalie became her assistant and took over managing her calendar, Pepper has suddenly found moments of calm in her schedule. Meetings become blessedly shorter and sensibly scheduled in adjacent rooms, real lunch breaks appear out of the ether. Mugs of herbal tea materialise in Natalie’s hand and are seamlessly traded for folders and papers as they make their efficient, high-heeled way from department to department. Natalie knows everything, anticipates everything, provides everything Pepper needs before she knows she needs it. _Oh_ , Pepper thinks, _this is what it feels like from the other side_. Still, when Natalie discreetly leans over and shows her Wednesday afternoon blocked out for working from home, Pepper thrills inside a little.

Natalie makes lunch on Wednesday with her own, fine-fingered hands, slicing vegetables thin enough to see through and drizzling on a balsamic reduction with expert casualness. She looks like she belongs in Pepper’s designer kitchen. She looks like she belongs everywhere. They eat on the sofa with a rerun of _The West Wing_ playing in the background.

‘Allison Janney!’ Pepper squeals, apropos of nothing.

‘Absolutely,’ Natalie agrees, emphasising the third syllable. She cuts her eyes over, hot and possessive for a moment. ‘I do like tall women.’ She puts her plate on the table. ‘Dessert or bed first, Pep?’

Of course it’s bed, because despite Natalie’s fierce time management skills Pepper does not have so many hours in her day that she’ll waste an afternoon with no immediate crises on _paperwork_. They barely reach the bed before Pepper has her hand sliding up Natalie’s dress and their lips sealed together. She pushes Natalie to sit, kneels on the floor in front of her and strips away her surprisingly sensible black cotton underwear. Between her legs, Natalie is pink and wet and furled like a delicate seashell, and Pepper tastes a hint of salt when she lets her tongue flicker inside. There were no women before Natalie but everything is so easy; to slip two of her fingers in, curl them gently; to roll her tongue over Natalie’s clit and feel her thighs tensing, her hips push up against Pepper’s mouth. In bed, Natalie comes apart and her limbs soften, her persona falls away, her rich red hair spills haphazardly across white sheets.

‘Pep,’ she says with blissful languor, ‘Pep, your mouth. Yes, god damn, you’re perfect, _yes_.’ Pepper wraps her left arm over Natalie’s hips and pulls her closer, fucking her slowly with her fingers and licking her clit, taking her time. Her lips and chin are wet as if she’s eating summer fruit; she imagines a ripe mango, or the lush, sinful sight of a pomegranate splitting open red and soft between her fingers. Natalie starts to shake in her hands, and then she gasps out in a great rush of breath and Pepper feels her muscles clench down and spasm. She presses the heel of her hand against Natalie’s clit, lets her ride out her orgasm against it, rubbing smoothly skin on skin where Natalie waxes herself bare.

‘I can’t move yet,’ Natalie laughs a minute later. ‘Come here.’ Pepper shucks her dress in a heartbeat and follows Natalie’s eager hands, which grab Pepper’s hips and pull her up until she’s kneeling over her lover’s face. ‘Gorgeous thing,’ she tells Pepper in a low voice, brushing a thumb over the dusting of red-gold hair over Pepper’s sex. Natalie cups the back of Pepper’s thighs, runs her hands across Pepper’s hipbones, wraps her forearms over her ass and hugs her against her face. She takes her time with Pepper, teasing with her tongue, lapping the inside of her thigh whenever Pepper starts to get close to coming.

‘Tease,’ Pepper tells her breathlessly, and Natalie curves her lips into her delightful, wicked smirk.

‘I could _drown_ in your pussy and be happy,’ she says, sweet and dirty because she knows it makes Pepper blush.

‘Natalie, _oh_ ,’ Pepper pants as she comes, legs trembling and wet down her right thigh almost to the knee. For half an hour afterwards they sit in bed eating tiny shortbread biscuits and fresh peaches and laughing, and nothing matters at all.

 

*

 

Sometimes, when nobody is looking at her, Natalie seems to blur out of focus. She is an intoxicating woman when she pleases, honing in on what people want with laser focus and giving it to them. Pepper has seen her effortlessly distract a conference room of men, leaving them all open to the most obvious of political ploys. She’s Pepper’s perfect ally in the boardroom, able to distract and dissemble and imply without anyone ever suspecting they’re being played. With a few well-placed words and gestures, Natalie prepares the ground for Pepper to lean in, look severe and pitch a suggestion, offer a deal, reject a proposal. Pepper lies in bed and watches her stare out of the window, leaning against the window frame as if posing for a life class. Standing nude in the window, framed by the light, Natalie’s hair spills over her shoulder and her palms are open. She is marble, alabaster, frozen in time like a Grecian goddess and just as unknowable.

It’s 6.30am and everything is very still. They have time.

‘Come back to bed,’ Pepper calls over softly, and holds her hand out.

‘Yes,’ Natalie says, and she takes it and kisses Pepper’s wrist. ‘Yes, I think I will.’


End file.
